Takeda and UCL muscle disorders deal

Takeda has tapped into research being undertaken at University College London which is looking to tackle muscle disorders, in particular muscular dystrophy.

UCL will get $250,000 from the Japanese major's New Frontier Sciences group, set up to provides funds to "external innovators" and access to resources and collaboration with Takeda scientists and engineers. The university researchers will focus on the study of muscular regeneration and the potential for stem cell therapies to treat muscular dystrophy, in particular induced pluripotent stem cells.

The team is also investigating the potential for treating muscular dystrophy through developing "gene and cell therapy strategies using artificial human chromosomes and novel biomaterials".

Francesco Saverio Tedesco, head of the UCL team, said that "this funding from Takeda comes at a crucial time", adding that they "will be building on the processes we’ve already shown to be promising and which could pave the way for the development of novel strategies for both cell therapies and drug discovery in muscle disorders.".

Gordon Wong, head of the NFS group at Takeda, stated that UCL's "ground-breaking work has the potential for significant patient benefit". He added: "That several different strands of their research have already borne fruit was strong evidence for us of the translational potential of Dr Tedesco’s research for muscular dystrophies.”